Doubles as its own game

In the doubles introduction you got to know the basic structure: attacking and rear-court player, the serving order, the foot rule, the first communication. This theme block goes into depth — and shows you that doubles is a game with its own laws, one that reaches through every area of your game.

What's special about doubles is that everything doubles and halves at the same time. You cover the area as a pair, so each of you has to cover less ground alone — but only if you divide it up cleverly. If you get in each other's way, you actually cover less than a single player who knows where to go.

That's why good doubles touches more than tactics. It demands tactical interplay (who attacks, who covers), coordinated movement (as a unit across the court), and constant communication (the short call, the agreement). These three threads — tactics, movement, communication — come together in doubles. The following modules take them up one by one.

A good doubles pair is like a dance couple. Two people move as one figure, each knows what the other is doing, and from two individuals a unit emerges that can do more than both together. A bad doubles pair is like two dancers to the same music who step on each other's feet.

Whoever grasps doubles as its own game, and not as singles with two people, has already taken the most important step.

Think back to your last doubles match: did you move as a unit, or were you two singles players on one court? Where were the gaps — in the middle, because nobody went, or at the sides, because both ran to the middle? Take this one question with you into the next modules: which of the three threads — interplay, movement, communication — is the one you struggle with most?